Well he got the eibach springs right? and they have them specifically for the XIs and are rated for a drop of 1". My Springs are B&G S2 Sport springs. They don't make them for the XIs, only for the I and are rated for a drop of 1.6" in the front and 1.4" in the rear. Could that be the difference?..XI springs vs I springs?

Only reason why I got those was I didnt want the huge drop that the B&G race springs would give yet I didn't want to be stage coaching either after putting forth the effort of removing and replacing the suspension. And I believe there are XI guys out there running on I springs...

Well he got the eibach springs right? and they have them specifically for the XIs and are rated for a drop of 1". My Springs are B&G S2 Sport springs. They don't make them for the XIs, only for the I and are rated for a drop of 1.6" in the front and 1.4" in the rear. Could that be the difference?..XI springs vs I springs?

Only reason why I got those was I didnt want the huge drop that the B&G race springs would give yet I didn't want to be stage coaching either after putting forth the effort of removing and replacing the suspension. And I believe there are XI guys out there running on I springs...

No actually that is what makes it so confusing. His drop should have been less, so if you don;t need to trim the stops he should not have had any problems. If they need to be trimmed, your car should have needed it it more.

This assumes everything was done right by everyone. What I meant by not letting it settle, to be clear, was when you lower a car off of jacks and do not roll it back and forth some, the suspension is not settled to actual ride height. If for example he just let it off the jacks, and measured then, it would seem high. I am not saying he did that but if he did it would explain some of this.

No actually that is what makes it so confusing. His drop should have been less, so if you don;t need to trim the stops he should not have had any problems. If they need to be trimmed, your car should have needed it it more.

This assumes everything was done right by everyone. What I meant by not letting it settle, to be clear, was when you lower a car off of jacks and do not roll it back and forth some, the suspension is not settled to actual ride height. If for example he just let it off the jacks, and measured then, it would seem high. I am not saying he did that but if he did it would explain some of this.

Got it. For me, the term settle would be driving it for a a few weeks to have the spring get use to the weight. I can tell you this as I did each corner, after the car was dropped off the jack, I took it around the block. So in regards to your term, yes, I did settle them in...

Well he got the eibach springs right? and they have them specifically for the XIs and are rated for a drop of 1". My Springs are B&G S2 Sport springs. They don't make them for the XIs, only for the I and are rated for a drop of 1.6" in the front and 1.4" in the rear. Could that be the difference?..XI springs vs I springs?

Unless it's news, I don't think eibach makes springs for the xi. xi drivers on eibach are running the springs they make for the i.

I was confused when i read that your front bumpstops were fine. I had installed my new springs and struts and dropped her down, it looked horible and i measured the gap and it dropped her only a small amount, .25". I then moved to the rear and swapped out the rear shocks.

As i was buttoning everything up, i thought about why my car was still near stock. I opened up the car door, stood on the sill and tried to rock her from side to side, i had no suspension travel in the front.

I then measured the distance from the purch to the bottom of the spring and compared them to the original strut, i got the same measurements, thinking the struts weren't fully seated. I then checked the part numbers of the springs and struts to make sure I didn't have a wrong part. I checked to make sure the springs were installed correctly and the end of the spring was lined up with the rubber. Everything checked out but no drop. I hated the way she lookes, ass end down and the front all high in the air mocking all my hard work!

I then took the flashlight and looked at the bumpstops and they were fully compressed. At that point i went inside and ate lunch. I did some searching around here on the forum and found others running into the same problem and they had cut the bumpstops or used lower bumstops. I didn't want to start cutting something and found out that i messed it up and would need to order more parts and wait some more. I didn't find much but I found a guy saying his mechanic installed the springs and he had to cut the bumpstops and noted it was a standard thing when installing lowering springs to adjust the suspension travel.

I convinced myself that was the issue and I went out to finish the job. My bumpstop was flat on the portion near the top hat as the ones i saw on the 335i had a little notch cutout on the top. Mine also had a rubber black ring unlike the ones i saw as well. It had three sections, the first had the rubber donut, a second nub, and then the last portion. When i looked at your post i noticed you had a 328xi, so i thought maybe bmw uses different ones between the two. I looked online for new ones and couldn't find one that matched my exact bumpstop. I ended up cutting the first two nubs off which was about 2 inches. Logic was, the bumpstop is compressed currently, i should get another 1" drop, plus I need some suspension travel, so 2" sounded like a good number. I only left the top portion which itself was a 1" to 1.5".

After I cut both sides and dropped it back to the ground, it was 25.5" from the wheel well to the ground. I looked underneath again to see where everything was sitting and i had about 1-1.5 inches of possible suspension travel before i hit the bumpstop. A week later and a couple hundred miles, its settled at 25.25"

I even made sure the lower spring purch on the strut was fully seated before installing the springs with a few taps of a hammer.

The things i dont understand, if the eibach springs rely on the bumpstop in the design, my car should be sitting lower with the bumpstops being cut since they arn't contacting and getting any help. If they designed it to have the additional resistance further in the spring compression, when i hit a bump, this means my struts are working overtime. Maybe thats why they can say that eibach can be ran with the OEM strut, the bumpstop limits the force the struts takes up. Since I didn't go with OEM, i should be fine i guess.

Still doesn't make sense to me. Maybe my situation was a fluke and quality control got a batch of the wrong bumpstops. All in all, my car is lowered, suspension feels solid and the car is nimble as hell, all smiles here!

I was confused when i read that your front bumpstops were fine. I had installed my new springs and struts and dropped her down, it looked horible and i measured the gap and it dropped her only a small amount, .25". I then moved to the rear and swapped out the rear shocks.

As i was buttoning everything up, i thought about why my car was still near stock. I opened up the car door, stood on the sill and tried to rock her from side to side, i had no suspension travel in the front.

I then measured the distance from the purch to the bottom of the spring and compared them to the original strut, i got the same measurements, thinking the struts weren't fully seated. I then checked the part numbers of the springs and struts to make sure I didn't have a wrong part. I checked to make sure the springs were installed correctly and the end of the spring was lined up with the rubber. Everything checked out but no drop. I hated the way she lookes, ass end down and the front all high in the air mocking all my hard work!

I then took the flashlight and looked at the bumpstops and they were fully compressed. At that point i went inside and ate lunch. I did some searching around here on the forum and found others running into the same problem and they had cut the bumpstops or used lower bumstops. I didn't want to start cutting something and found out that i messed it up and would need to order more parts and wait some more. I didn't find much but I found a guy saying his mechanic installed the springs and he had to cut the bumpstops and noted it was a standard thing when installing lowering springs to adjust the suspension travel.

I convinced myself that was the issue and I went out to finish the job. My bumpstop was flat on the portion near the top hat as the ones i saw on the 335i had a little notch cutout on the top. Mine also had a rubber black ring unlike the ones i saw as well. It had three sections, the first had the rubber donut, a second nub, and then the last portion. When i looked at your post i noticed you had a 328xi, so i thought maybe bmw uses different ones between the two. I looked online for new ones and couldn't find one that matched my exact bumpstop. I ended up cutting the first two nubs off which was about 2 inches. Logic was, the bumpstop is compressed currently, i should get another 1" drop, plus I need some suspension travel, so 2" sounded like a good number. I only left the top portion which itself was a 1" to 1.5".

After I cut both sides and dropped it back to the ground, it was 25.5" from the wheel well to the ground. I looked underneath again to see where everything was sitting and i had about 1-1.5 inches of possible suspension travel before i hit the bumpstop. A week later and a couple hundred miles, its settled at 25.25"

I even made sure the lower spring purch on the strut was fully seated before installing the springs with a few taps of a hammer.

The things i dont understand, if the eibach springs rely on the bumpstop in the design, my car should be sitting lower with the bumpstops being cut since they arn't contacting and getting any help. If they designed it to have the additional resistance further in the spring compression, when i hit a bump, this means my struts are working overtime. Maybe thats why they can say that eibach can be ran with the OEM strut, the bumpstop limits the force the struts takes up. Since I didn't go with OEM, i should be fine i guess.

Still doesn't make sense to me. Maybe my situation was a fluke and quality control got a batch of the wrong bumpstops. All in all, my car is lowered, suspension feels solid and the car is nimble as hell, all smiles here!

Yeah that doesn't make sense at all. All I know is there was a significant difference in size when I compared the OEM spring to the B&G and installing them was easier because I didn't have to compress them as much like I did with the original.

I was confused when i read that your front bumpstops were fine. I had installed my new springs and struts and dropped her down, it looked horible and i measured the gap and it dropped her only a small amount, .25". I then moved to the rear and swapped out the rear shocks.

As i was buttoning everything up, i thought about why my car was still near stock. I opened up the car door, stood on the sill and tried to rock her from side to side, i had no suspension travel in the front.

I then measured the distance from the purch to the bottom of the spring and compared them to the original strut, i got the same measurements, thinking the struts weren't fully seated. I then checked the part numbers of the springs and struts to make sure I didn't have a wrong part. I checked to make sure the springs were installed correctly and the end of the spring was lined up with the rubber. Everything checked out but no drop. I hated the way she lookes, ass end down and the front all high in the air mocking all my hard work!

I then took the flashlight and looked at the bumpstops and they were fully compressed. At that point i went inside and ate lunch. I did some searching around here on the forum and found others running into the same problem and they had cut the bumpstops or used lower bumstops. I didn't want to start cutting something and found out that i messed it up and would need to order more parts and wait some more. I didn't find much but I found a guy saying his mechanic installed the springs and he had to cut the bumpstops and noted it was a standard thing when installing lowering springs to adjust the suspension travel.

I convinced myself that was the issue and I went out to finish the job. My bumpstop was flat on the portion near the top hat as the ones i saw on the 335i had a little notch cutout on the top. Mine also had a rubber black ring unlike the ones i saw as well. It had three sections, the first had the rubber donut, a second nub, and then the last portion. When i looked at your post i noticed you had a 328xi, so i thought maybe bmw uses different ones between the two. I looked online for new ones and couldn't find one that matched my exact bumpstop. I ended up cutting the first two nubs off which was about 2 inches. Logic was, the bumpstop is compressed currently, i should get another 1" drop, plus I need some suspension travel, so 2" sounded like a good number. I only left the top portion which itself was a 1" to 1.5".

After I cut both sides and dropped it back to the ground, it was 25.5" from the wheel well to the ground. I looked underneath again to see where everything was sitting and i had about 1-1.5 inches of possible suspension travel before i hit the bumpstop. A week later and a couple hundred miles, its settled at 25.25"

I even made sure the lower spring purch on the strut was fully seated before installing the springs with a few taps of a hammer.

The things i dont understand, if the eibach springs rely on the bumpstop in the design, my car should be sitting lower with the bumpstops being cut since they arn't contacting and getting any help. If they designed it to have the additional resistance further in the spring compression, when i hit a bump, this means my struts are working overtime. Maybe thats why they can say that eibach can be ran with the OEM strut, the bumpstop limits the force the struts takes up. Since I didn't go with OEM, i should be fine i guess.

Still doesn't make sense to me. Maybe my situation was a fluke and quality control got a batch of the wrong bumpstops. All in all, my car is lowered, suspension feels solid and the car is nimble as hell, all smiles here!

OK the only thing I can think of here is you maybe did not move the car enough after installing the fronts, and the suspension was binding up, not allowing it to settle to its natural ride height.

By this I mean when you jack up one end of an independent suspension car (both wheels off the ground on one end, front or back), the susp. sags, and the bottom edge of both tires move in towards the center line (quite a bit actually), top edge moves out. Then when you let it back down the bottom of the tires are too close together, and the car sits very high. Just rolling the car a few feet back and forth lets it settle, ideally you'd drive it around the block or something.

Anyway this is the only think I can think of. Obviously does not happen on a solid axle. More pronounced on a McPherson strut front end as the control arms are shorter (+not a wishbone/5-link so camber changes more so tire edge moves in more) vs rear end that has very long control arms.

i'm assuming there has to be some differences between the 328 vs the 335. There are separate part numbers for them from eibach which would mean they had to have different spring rates or overall spring height.

For eibach they have one part number (2092.140) for the e90/e92 335i (kit i have). This should get 1.4 front, 1 rear drop.

For 328i, there are separate part numbers for e90 (2085.140) and e92(2091.140).

Just using what i found out on eibach, assume things are the same for the other springs out there.

Koni's for the front are 8741 1535 l/r sport, fits all 3 series xi models.

Besides the extra time diagnosing the bump stops, the install was surprisingly easy. Its more of a mental thing. After this experience, I would rather do struts and springs on the bmw than replace a serpintine belt on an Audi. You have to remove the entire front end and push out the radiator support to get an extra 3" to get to the belt. I had to do mine earlier this year on my old S4 cabrio.

All said and done, I haven't looked back besides sharing my experience. Well worth the time and effort for the results, both looks and handling. I felt the car had way too much power for the suspension. Missed shifts due to nose lift as well as front wheel scratch during heavy trottle.

Just because you have an awd car doesn't mean you need all that extra ground clearance.

Koni's for the front are 8741 1535 l/r sport, fits all 3 series xi models.

Besides the extra time diagnosing the bump stops, the install was surprisingly easy. Its more of a mental thing. After this experience, I would rather do struts and springs on the bmw than replace a serpintine belt on an Audi. You have to remove the entire front end and push out the radiator support to get an extra 3" to get to the belt. I had to do mine earlier this year on my old S4 cabrio.

All said and done, I haven't looked back besides sharing my experience. Well worth the time and effort for the results, both looks and handling. I felt the car chipped had way too much power for the suspension. Missed shifts due to nose lift as well as front wheel scratch during heavy trottle.

Just because you have an awd car doesn't mean you need all that extra ground clearance.

Yeah so you and I are running the same Koni Struts and most likely the same rear shocks as well. So the only difference would be the spring and installation. I agree with your last statement but had I known I was going to mod this car, i would have just bought the 335i that was on sale next to mine. Gotta love hind sight!

So the mystery is not solved regarding trimming bump stops or not. I am going to do the koni yellow/eibach pro kit later this summer. For a 335xi coupe. I'll get some e36 M3 & Z4 bump stops just in case, and do some measuring prior to disassembling everything...

Bumpstops do not affect ride height. Springs determine ride height.
Cutting bumpstops allows for an additional inch or so of travel near the bottom of the damper's stroke. This is a benefit for lowered cars, since they have reduced shock travel lengths compared to stock. Cutting, or even omitting, bumpstops will not change how a car sits. Bumpstops prevent shocks from being damaged from being bottomed out. Bumpstops do not change the behavior of a suspension system. They are a rubber buffer to prevent metal to metal contact within the damper.